The Mormon Prophet and His Harem: Or, An Authentic History of Brigham Young, His Numerous Wives and ChildrenWaite, C. V. (Catherine Van Valkenburg)
History
The Mormon Prophet and His Harem: Or, An Authentic History of Brigham Young, His Numerous Wives and Children
Waite, C. V. (Catherine Van Valkenburg)
Latter Day Saint churches; Young, Brigham, 1801-1877
Mr. Taussig, a simple and unpretending man, had succeeded in
establishing a substantial tannery well stocked with leather. By some
designing persons he was induced to refuse the payment of his taxes, on
the ground that they were exorbitant, and the Territorial Collector sold
the property, which was bought by one of Brigham's agents, and the poor
man reduced to poverty.
In the fall of 1857, Brigham called a mass meeting in the Tabernacle,
and after dilating upon the disadvantages the people were laboring under
in being without a currency, established a bank, calling upon the
faithful to bring in all their gold and silver, and receive the new
paper currency in exchange. This was done. In a few months the bank was
suspended, and depositors were paid in labor tithing, for the currency
held by them, in exchange for their gold and silver.
One Mr. Tennant, a gentleman residing in Lancashire, England, embraced
Mormonism. His property was estimated at over $70,000. He was soon
marked as a victim. By appliances and representations brought to bear
with much assiduity, he was induced to purchase of Brigham Young a house
in Salt Lake, which he had never seen, and pay for the same the sum of
$20,000; about four times its value. In addition to this, large sums of
money were obtained from him by the Elders, under pretence of his
becoming a share-holder and partner with Young in grist-mills, sugar
machinery, iron-works, &c., solemnly assuring him in relation to its
safe investment and future profits. Mr. Tennant died while crossing the
Plains, leaving a wife, with a young child. On arriving in Salt Lake,
Mrs. Tennant, instead of being comfortably installed in the house
purchased by her husband, found herself placed in lodgings, the
carriage, horses, and other property seized upon, and herself placed
under the control of a guardian. This, together with the loss of her
husband, so worked upon her mind, that she became insane. Afterward
Brigham gave her in marriage to Daniel Spencer, as his fourth or fifth
wife, and thus completed the wrongs for which the poor woman will call
him to account in the day of judgment. She now lives upon a miserable
pittance doled out from the tithing-office.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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